UniCoV

UniCoV Study

To facilitate the safe, continual return to on-campus learning and teaching for university students and staff, the UniCoV Project conducted a large-scale comparative analysis of testing technologies for use in COVID 19 disease surveillance and prevention in higher education settings in 2021 and 2022. Findings will inform the development of early warning systems and expedite future outbreak prevention and control. 

UniCoV is a multi-site, randomised controlled clinical study led by the University of Galway (UoG) (formally the National University of Ireland, Galway) in partnership with Trinity College Dublin (TCD), University College Dublin (UCD) and University College Cork (UCC). Funded by Science Foundation Ireland, the four universities and the HSE; and supported by the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research Innovation and Science and Department of Health, UniCoV will further develop and apply testing, screening and surveillance strategies, proven tools used by Public Health to assist with early warning systems for disease, in the context of SARS-CoV-2 infection in Ireland. Involving both students and staff, the UniCoV study explores the feasibility and acceptability of self-reporting, self-testing and biosamples surveillance systems to assist with the safe and sustainable re-opening of Higher Education Institutes’ (HEI) campuses, and society more broadly.

Open Invitation to UniCoV Conference

On Friday 2^nd December 2022, UniCoV would like to invite you to the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (RCPI), to present the findings of the collaborating university partners and to discuss the future of pandemic planning at third level settings and beyond.

What to Expect?

The UniCoV Conference will be opened by Simon Harris, Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, and include talks from State Chief Medical Officer Prof Breda Smyth, international guest speakers, Union of Students in Ireland (USI), Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) and Ireland’s leading health care researchers from UoG, UCC, UCD and TCD.

• Lessons learned from rapidly establishing a research project which delivered rapid testing, during a pandemic
• Testing outcomes and results; 4,500 participants, 75,000 rapid tests and multi-site wastewater SARS-CoV-2 surveillance
• Looking to the future; how smart app-based health care technology platforms and point of care testing can deliver better health care

Please see the UniCoV Conference Schedule and register here for this free event. 

If you have any further queries in advance of registering to participate in this study, please email unicov@ucd.ie.